Untitled

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4570, 12 November 1875, Page 2

A general statement of the liabilities and assets of the various banks in the colony for the quarter ended 30th September, is published in the Gazette, from which it appears that the total value of notes in circulation is £859,228 ; bills in circulation, £09,365 ; balances due to other banks, £50,041 ; deposits (Government), £1,193,345 ; (not bearing interest), £2,470,740; (bearing interest), £2,560,477 ; total liabilities, £7,209,497. The assets are put down at £10,999,039, made up as follows : —Coin, £1,446,782; bullion, £177,798 ; notes and bills of other banks, £29,430 ; balances due from other banks, £48,960 ; landed property, £186,187 ; notes and bills discounted, £4,445,033 ; Colonial Government securities, £350,000 ; other funded securities, £7600 ; debts due to the banks, exclusive of bad debts, £4,022,871 ; other securities, £284,455. The Bank of New Zealand shows a business far above that of others, its liabilities being put down at £3,951,326, and assets £4,938,330. The new bank —the Colonial Bank of New Zealand —seems to be getting on well. Its liabilities are £258,958, and the assets £510,904.

The Qazctte of last night contains the usual quarterly returns of imports and exports, which are set down as follows :—lmports, £2,041,237, as against £2,280,543 for corresponding quarter of last year. Auckland imports are valued at £482,207, as against £510,598 last year; Wellington, £343,940, as against £346,586 last year; Lyttelton, £355,263, as against £340,594 last year ; Dunedin, £553,618, as against £754,528 last year. Exports, total value £767, 891, as against £668,788 corresponding quarter last year. Auckland exports are set down at £175,563, as against £124,073 during corresponding quarter of last year; Wellington, £123,990, as against £31,298 last year; Lyttelton, £137,892, as against £98,420 last year; Dunedin, £137,447, as against £210,207 last year.

During the past quarter 227 vessels have arrived in New Zealand ports from places out of the colony; the gross tonnage being 106,154 tons. Of these, 58 arrived in Auckland, 31 in Wellington, 41 in Lyttelton, and 43 in Dunedin. The total arrivals for the corresponding quarter of last year were 231; total tonnage, 117,625 tons. Vessels which have cleared out are numbered at 229, with a total tonnage of 103,200 tons, as against 216, of a total tonnage of 111,035, during the corresponding period of 1874. From Auckland 56 have sailed; Wellington, 30; Lyttelton, 51; Dunedin, 31.

The Timaru Herald of a recent date has a very severe article on the provincial banquet at Dunedin, and the orators at the same. After disposing of Sir George Grey and Mr. Macandrevv in an extremely trenchant manner, the article goes on to notice Mr. Fitzherbert, and says of him: —" Few colonists are old enough to remember the time when he was not in one office or another. He went to England to negotiate a loan, and in 1869 the Assembly, almost blushing—if they could blush—voted him three thousand pounds for his pains. Three thousand pounds of the people's money in hard cash that dear old gentleman received, for having made a pleasure trip to England at Government expense, with full salary, and four guineas a day as travelling allowance. Throughout all the sundry and manifold changes, too, of his official position or his political creed, he managed in the most dexterous way to retain his office of Commissioner of Crown Lands in Wellington (although such retention was illegal and indecent); and, at this very moment, though a Superintendent, he enjoys the pension of that post. Never was there a more grasping, selfish public man, or one who kept his own interests more constantly in view. Yet he preaches purity and self-sacrifice. ' Continue,' he had the barefaced assurance to say, "to do honor to men who arc no richer to-day than when they landed on your shores, because they have been doing your public works !' A splendid sentiment, indeed, from one who having pocketed every penny he could get out of centralism, is now sucking provincialism like a leech. Mr. Fitzherbert should certainly have been the last man in New Zealand to vaunt himself as a disinterested public man."